Laura on the Lake She is happy, now, in my dream by the lake. I see her cascading chocolate hair and citrine eyes set deeply in grinning cheeks, soft cheeks I don’t quite kiss. I don’t quite embrace her; she plays in the shallows with my Aunt’s granddaughters— who did not exist, then— near what… Continue reading Laura Returns Again

I feel like I need to get this off of my chest: I lacked courage all along. Just now I asked myself "why don't I feel like writing even though I know I want to be an author?" yet another instance in scores of times. This time I answered myself honestly: "because I don't want… Continue reading A River to Wash the Pain

Vocabulary.com offers conflux as a synonym for confluence, as "a flowing together" or "the act of blending together components thoroughly"; its connotations are slightly different from the riparian 'confluence', which is the name of a nascent entry that I never wrote because I could not get it perfectly in-mind. After browsing an entry by a… Continue reading Conflux #1

Seeds germinated. Burial makes life possible two-thousand years later: bogged-resurrection, the wait that moves life forward. Ending and beginning are impossible as opposites before they have fused together in one moment. Something is dissolving in me: let me set the scene... My dearest is a botany teacher; I will call her Apricot from now on.… Continue reading Bog Flowers, Nut Armor, and the Paradox of Precocity

I ran at a steady pace up Fort Totten Hill. Its summit was raised a level higher by the Civil War era Earth-works of the fort upon that hill. Trees occlude its remains but paths of worn stones persist. My irregular running routine had not greatly affected my ability to climb the weather cracked easement… Continue reading Red Fox & Blue Butterfly

The morning after my graduate coursework was complete, and with no more school assignments to write, I sat in dim quiet. A restlessness stirred in my core but fatigue lingered-on. I decided to try a self-compassion exercise I found on the Internet. It told me to think of an uncomplicated love and I tried to… Continue reading Mind-Trip: Visiting Past Selves

Long after Easter, returned from my exile and baking in the summer sun, I was in Beit Sahour waiting for the bus; I met eyes with a young man commuting from job to home. As he approached he said “Shalom”. But I pretended not to understand him at all, apologizing and asking him what he'd… Continue reading A Word on God (after Easter)

It is possible that I smelled hope. It was hard for me to believe, too, since I was not aware that alligators could smell. I was readying to crawl into a mound of decaying leaves next to one of the remaining snow-piles. Only a few weeks ago there were vast chains of snow-piles all around… Continue reading Smelling Hope

As I closed my phone, or put it upon the receiver, or swiped to the left (whatever people do now) I thought again about the job position. Preliminary phone interviews are as much reconnaissance as trial: I did not want it. I took a kernel of sweet-gum and put it into my mouth. It felt… Continue reading An Alligator

It is not often that I feature others' content here but my former colleague's thoughts and feelings speak directly to my own condition. Nevertheless, her words belong to her and I hope that you will spare a moment to take note of her: Source: Unsettled Uncomfortable Slightly Scrambled Lenten Thoughts Background: my former colleague is… Continue reading Unsettled Uncomfortable Slightly Scrambled Lenten Thoughts